An Analysis of Sustainable Development in the Tourism Industry

This essay examines sustainable development within the tourism sector, highlighting its significance and the challenges it faces. It discusses the benefits of tourism while also addressing its negative impacts, such as resource overexploitation, environmental pollution, and the spread of undesirable socio-cultural practices. The essay emphasizes the importance of sustainability in tourism, advocating for changes in tourist consumption behaviors, responsible resource usage, and the implementation of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives. It suggests that the sector should prioritize environmental conservation and sustainable practices for the benefit of future generations. Furthermore, the essay references Plog’s Model of Tourist Behavior to understand the motivations of tourists and develop effective strategies for improving the sector's sustainability, recommending the proper implementation of sustainability programs for desired behavioral change.

Running head: SUSTAINABE DEVELOPMENT 1
Sustainable Development
Name
Institution

SUSTAINABE DEVELOPMENT 2
Sustainable Development
Tourism is one of the most popular and lucrative sectors in the society today. Every day,
individuals leave the comfort of their homes to travel far and wide to engage in domestic or
international tourism. Whereas domestic tourism refers to the visitation of the tourist attractions
within a country, international tourism involves foreign visitations in which people travel to visit
other foreign countries. There are many ways through which tourism has benefited the society.
However, it has also disadvantaged the society in many ways.
One of the issues that have become of concern to the tourism and hospitality sector is
sustainability. Today, the society has been facing a myriad of challenges such as overexploitation
of resources and unsustainability. These happen because of many challenges such as
irresponsible utilization of the resources. Although tourists benefit the host town by creating
employment opportunities and boosting commerce, it has negatively impacted on the residents in
many ways. This has been happening because of any reasons such as the overutilization of the
available resources such as food, water, and many others. Besides, tourism has been contributing
to environmental pollution, thanks to its reliance on the fossil fuel-consuming automobiles,
trains, airplanes, and many others (Lee & Hsieh, 2016). Apart from this, tourism do negatively-
impact on the host nations by spreading undesirable socio-cultural practices such as
consumerism, irresponsible dressing codes, sexual misconduct, and even diseases. All these
make life unsustainable.
For tourism and hospitality sector to be as viable as it should be, it should be made to be
sustainable. Meaning, the stakeholders should take the necessary measures to rectify the
loopholes and make the sector to be the way it ought to. The individual tourists should change

SUSTAINABE DEVELOPMENT 3
their consumption behaviors and refrain from unnecessary acts of consumerism. There
should be a responsible usage of available resources without unnecessarily straining their supply.
Besides, the tourism and hospitality sector should be guided by the principle of responsibility.
The sector players should come up with appropriate Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)
initiatives and implement them appropriately (Edgell Sr, 2016). In the CSR efforts, the sector
should initiate plans aimed at conserving the environment and sustainably using it for the benefit
of the future generations. Such initiatives should include the preservation of the environment and
stoppage of pollution. Such changes are worthy and can make tourism to be sustainable.
The success of the sustainability programs can be attained if they are appropriately-
implemented. For the desired sectoral and individual tourist behavior change to be attained, the
changes should be implemented in line with the principles of the Plog’s Model of Tourists
Behavior which, of course, studies the sector by analyzing the behaviors of individual
tourists. According to this theory, tourists visit a place because they are motivated to
explore their surrounding as allocentric, mid-centric, and psychocentric visitors. This
shows that there are different factors that motivate tourists to travel (Mihalic, 2016).
Therefore, if this theory is appropriately applied, it can play a significant role in understanding
the underlying challenges and coming up with a well-thought and feasible strategy to use in
rectifying and improving the situation so as to make tourism a thriving and sustainable sector.

SUSTAINABE DEVELOPMENT 4
References
Edgell Sr, D. L. (2016). Managing sustainable tourism: A legacy for the future. New York:
Routledge.
Lee, T. H., & Hsieh, H. P. (2016). Indicators of sustainable tourism: A case study from a
Taiwan's wetland. Ecological Indicators, 67, 779-787.
Mihalic, T. (2016). Sustainable-responsible tourism discourse–Towards ‘responsustable’tourism.
Journal of Cleaner Production, 111, 461-470.